A preliminary investigation into the effects of strong missionary influence and oil development on the land use practices of Waorani communities in the Ecuadorian Amazon. – Ciara Wirth, Varsha Vijay and Nicole Scheuneman
Introduction: Participatory GIS, or PGIS, is a system developed in the 1980s to provide a better interface between researchers and indigenous peoples. Today, with the advent of modern GPS technologies, it has become feasible even in the most remote corners of the world, under some of the densest tree canopies. Ideally the process rests on community participation and delineation of objectives, followed by the creation of a physical map product. This process encourages the unique point of view of the indigenous peoples rather than the academician and it also believes in the right of the indigenous peoples to data ownership. In the recent years PGIS has also come to include the objective of empowering the community toward advocacy and greater knowledge of both the research process and the value of the information gained.
Process: This study, involved three different Waorani communities: Damointaro, Tobeta, and Bameno. These three communities were selected both because of their interest in participating and also because of the variety of environments that the communities represent: Tobeta is a community perforated by oil roads and oil drilling platforms, Damointaro is the site of an international missionary institute, and Bameno is touted as the most traditional of the Waorani communities.
Objective: To provide a clear and concise map displaying both the assets and deficits present in a single Waorani community as defined by community consensus. In the field, emphasis was also placed on educating the members of the community on the skills needed to construct such a map. These skills ranged from the basic – the concepts of data accuracy, latitude and longitude, and map visualization – to the much more complex, the use of the handheld GPS receiver. We also attempted to speak on less utilitarian subjects, such as the function of geostationary satellites and the utility of technology in advocating for education, land, and medical resources. All explanations were delivered in Spanish, but Waorani collaborators in each community translated information from Spanish to Wao Terero for the elders. The Waorani leadership organizations NAWE and AMWAE, expressed interest in having a brochure that could discuss some comparisons of land use between the communities, as a means of starting dialogue about the way in which outside pressures are changing the traditional Waorani way of life. For this document, pictures of the maps will be used, but the actual coordinates will not be included.
Map depicting Waorani communities: the three study sites are marked with red circles (left-right: most being Damointaro, Tobeta, Bameno)
Damointaro
Damointaro, a community with a history of frequent contact by missionaries in conjunction with the Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF), was our first study site. Borrowing on an idea used first by the Ecuadorian scientific organization EcoCiencia, we asked the villagers to draw a map on paper in order to visualize the community resources and problems that they would like recorded. In order to accomplish this task we set up a town-hall style meeting in the schoolhouse where we discussed the basic principles of mapmaking, and lead a brainstorming session designed to encourage as many members of the community as possible to participate in the mapmaking process. Immediately it became clear that certain members of the community, primarily men, were more enthusiastic about participating in the actual drawing of the map, though many others were present and occasionally offered input offering up hunting locations and or other landmarks as well as pointing out sites of known contamination or clear-cutting.
From left to right: Community member explaining the map key; some community members drawing the map; the final map
The second phase of the study involved marking the points identified on the paper map, using the GPS receivers. To do this we instructed all the Waorani present, how to both mark the point on the GPS device and to keep a record of it in a paper log. In this task we saw a greater participation by the women, which was encouraging. After the instruction concluded, we accompanied the Waorani on day-long hikes designed to mark as many of the points possible. We found, to our delight, that once in the jungle the Waorani were able to point out many things that were not even shown on the paper map, such as the location of certain medicinal plants. Also encouraging was the involvement of the elders, the only ones who knew the location of the community boundaries or the historical significance of certain sites. In Damointaro, along with pointing out traditional knowledge the focus was on locating points that could be used for tourism as well as delineating a boundary, an effort that they hoped would ease border conflicts with neighboring communities.
From left to right: Waorani women teaching the men how to use the GPS; Waorani children learning how to use the GPS; Waorani man taking a community boundary point; a community elder telling a story during a GPS walk
Tobeta
Tobeta, the second study location is a community heavily affected by oil exploration. Located adjacent to the Yasuni National Park, Tobeta is also the least traditional community in terms of preserving Waorani customs and language. The study methodology remained the same in this community, but parts were modified to reflect the community members’ comfort level with technology (Almost every adult in the community had a cell phone with fairly advanced capabilities). In the introduction session, we added detail to the description of the GPS receiver’s function speaking briefly about geostationary satellites and their role in conducting signals to the receiver. Because the community no longer possessed some of the traditional knowledge we did not spend as much time cataloguing medicinal plants or exploring hunting grounds, as the community relies primarily on outside food sources, and instead spent time locating points of conflict with colonos ,the settlers who are technically infringing on Waorani land, and locations of oil contamination.
Community leaders were also eager to mark the location of a proposed site for a community based tourism project and, unfortunately, the proposed site of oil speculation. In Tobeta, we found the residents already had a strong agenda for the data and expressed an interest in using the results to petition the government.
From left to right: Map drawn by community in Tobeta (circular objects represent oil posts); community members collecting GPS points and recording pertinent data; an oil truck passing through the community (a common occurrence); children in the community taking pictures and videos of us with their cell phones.
Bameno
The last community, Bameno, is considered by many to epitomize a pristine rainforest community. It is located just beside the Intangible Zone, and it is a popular destination for ecotourism as a result of the high rate of biodiversity proximal to the main community center. Because of its distance from roads and more populous communities, Bameno is a financially challenging place to reach. As a result our travel was facilitated by the Waorani women’s organization, AMWAE, which was holding meetings and workshops in the community. This provided a challenge to our methodology because it prevented a town-hall approach involving the men and the women. Here, even more than the other communities, the paper map was executed by a few men. This community, as evidenced by those few men who participated, seemed less familiar with the process of mapmaking and had no previous maps to base theirs on. This resulted in a very unique and detailed interpretation of the land area. The hikes were also led by these few men, an approach which was in contrast to our desires to involve a majority of the community.In Bameno, the community expressed a desire to begin marking attractions for ecotourists and to document landmarks and hunting locations.
Though the community was not pristine, because there were significant impacts from outside culture, they still possessed much of the traditional knowledge of plants and animals and utilized the jungle resources for much of their dietary needs. In this community the enthusiasm for the project was not as great, a fact that can be attributed partially to the sheer quantity of researchers who have previously worked in the community. As a side note, this fact alone made it interesting that the community members were still unfamiliar with the technology and seemed not to have seen a map of their community area.
From left to right: Men from the community drawing the map; the final map; community member taking GPS points.
Observations: Though only in the pilot phase, this initial study provided some interesting observations about the feasibility of using PGIS and geospatial technologies to allow the Waorani to advocate directly for themselves. In each of the three communities visited, at the end of the project it was generally agreed by the community that the exercise had been useful. What remains to be seen is whether that enthusiasm provides the momentum needed to continue existing advocacy efforts and to initiate new ones.
Because of their familiarity with cell phone technology and internet, community members in Tobeta were best able to understand the technical instruction prior to the project (After the initial lecture the children were redrawing some of the diagrams used to explain the concepts and re-explaining it to each other) and managed to grasp the user interface of the GPS devices well enough to use them and the record the data logs virtually without our assistance. In contrast, the community of Damointaro, which was less comfortable with the technology, excelled at pointing out plants and animal habitats and in involving most of the community who all participated enthusiastically in the data collection. In yet another contrast, the community of Bameno offered perhaps the most opportunities for marking points due to the largely intact habitat and cultural knowledge possessed by the men who participated.
Future Directions: The map products remain to be completed, a process which will, in the future, dictate the rate at which other communities can be similarly mapped. Initial reviews of the data are interesting, but show gaps which may need to be filled in during future field research trips. This is also a juncture where we may need to consider, for example, what utility for the community that the additional detail may provide. In some cases, a cave that is not marked may not be as important as gathering more details on tourist trails or new points of contamination. Currently the project is also limited by the number of GPS devices, 2, available for use. With the current number of devices, additional detail may require significantly more time, suggesting that the maximal utility for both time and expense may lie in collaboration with other organizations like WCS and Accion Ecologia who are currently working on mapping. The advantage of the PGIS model, which emphasizes data ownership by the participants, is that they too can seek out additional detail by contacting researchers or organizations with whom they have worked in the past, or they can use the existing data to complement advocacy efforts being facilitated by other groups inside and outside of Ecuador.
In the upcoming year we plan to utilize the same technology in a slightly different PGIS model: documenting the effects of contamination through marking geographical location complaints in conjunction with first-person interviews. This project, which is less personnel intensive than the community resource mapping project provides another example for the use of this same technology leading hopefully to a variety of models that can be used as the onus for organizing and executing these projects shifts away from us and toward the communities in the coming years.
II. The Project Plan Submitted for Funding
When I applied for this project, I proposed a plan to work with Waorani communities to determine a more accurate distribution of the Tagaeri and the Taromenane. I intended to document oral and pictorial accounts of the locations of Tagaeri and or Taromenane sightings from as many of the 34 Waorani communities as time would allow, giving preference to those communities in closest proximity to the Zona Intangible (ZI). This data would be compiled and plotted on a map using Geographic Imaging Software (GIS). This map, as well as records of the testimonials would have been submitted to the Waorani government organization NAWE, where it could be used to argue for a re-drawing of the boundaries of the ZI. I further indicated that I would try to pursue two minor projects:
- collect population data for a population census
- document the education infrastructure in each community.
A series of factors prevented me from completing any of the projects indicated. Weeks before my arrival in Ecuador, I became aware that an NGO had already started working on the same project (this was led by Jose Proaño, president of the Ecuadorian branch of Land is Life). However, this did not pose a problem because they had not completed their data collection, and our research dates would overlap. Dr. Proaño indicated that he would be willing to collaborate with me, and that we could collect data provided that we traveled together to the communities. Unfortunately, days before I began my research, Dr. Proaño received notice that he would have to travel to a conference in Brazil during the time frame in which my involvement in this research would have been possible. In regards to the two other minor projects that were considered, time constraints prevented me from completing the necessary IRB process that would have allowed me to collect this data. Fortunately, Dr. Proano was able to suggest a research project that he thought AMWAE, NAWE and the Waorani communities would be interested in collaborating on.
III. What I gained from the experience:
This summer experience has shaped my future career interests. I was previously interested in studying ecosystems to influence resource management decisions. Now, I am interested in working at the interface between scientists and indigenous communities to investigate the ways in which modern technology and scientific methods can be integrated into indigenous communities in ways that compliment the long term cultural interests of those communities (where those cultural interests require health ecosystems). This project greatly improved my communication, planning, and leadership skills. This was the first time I had ever organized logistics for a major research project, and aside from some basic guidance from Dr. Proaño, we were on our own working with AMWAE and with the communities. We had to contact the leaders of the communities (or their relatives, in the case of Bameno and Damointaro), explain the basics of PGIS, and ask them if they were interested. If they were interested, we worked with them to organize dates for our arrival, and to decide what provisions to bring. We traveled by bus or plane to the nearest cities, bought what we thought would be necessary provisions, and traveled to the communities either by plane (Damointaro), bus (Tobeta), or canoe (Bameno). Once we were in the communities, we worked with our communities to carry out the PGIS projects. The primary language used to execute any of our work was Spanish. Aside from talking to my two research partners, I spoke Spanish for the entirety of this two month long research project. And since I was the fluent Spanish speaker in my research team, I ended up having to speak quite frequently. In the communities in which we worked, most people spoke two languages: Wao Terero and Spanish. It was common for the elders to speak their native tongue exclusively. Through great effort throughout the entire research period, I gained basic proficiency in Wao Terero. This is one of the feats of which I am most proud. This language is spoken by little more than 2,000 people and it is considered by linguists to be uncharacterizable. During the mapping project, I saw many plants, and learned their names in Wao Terero and their medicinal properties. I was also taught how sing a few Waorani songs, how to throw a spear and use a blowgun, and how to make thread out of chambira (the palm fibre used for making nets, jewlery, bags and other artesanias). I have never learned so much first hand about another culture from the people belonging to that culture.
Exposure to Current Events Related to my Proposed Research Project
I was able to attend a conference in the Waorani community of Noñeno, organized by the ministry of the environment to discuss and present their plans to ensure the safety of the Waorani tribes in voluntary isolation. I met the Ministry of Environment staff that was involved in developing a game plan to protect the tribes in voluntary isolation from illegal loggers, disease from nearby Waorani communities, as well as other threats. I was also able to meet Waorani who were interested in protecting the Tagaeri and Taromenane, as well as Waorani who were afraid of them, or who hated them, or who wanted to contact them. These experiences re-affirmed, reinforced my views on importance of having a more accurate understanding of distribution of the Tagaeri and the Taromenane.
